The instructors started working their way round the tables, handing out sealed envelopes. I watched as Shaun worked his way towards our table, my stomach churning. I wasn’t sure I wanted to open my envelope and discover just how many subjects I had failed.
“Portals will be opened from mid-day to return each of you to your packs. Please see the listings at the back of the hall for your departure times. The rest of the morning is yours to do as you please with. Enjoy your meals, and I look forward to seeing you again next year.”
Shaun dropped an envelope in front of me, and I picked it up in trembling hands. He passed more envelopes out, to Dean, Mei, Cam and the others.
“You first,” I said to Cam, dropping mine back to the table. He smiled, flipped his open, and pulled out the sheet. I scanned it over his shoulder, and then groaned. Maybe I should have found someone who wasn’t perfect to go first.
“Nice work, mate,” Dean said, leaning over the table and scanning his results. “Me next, then?”
He opened his envelope and read the letter inside. One look at his face was enough to tell me everything I needed to know.
“Well done,” I said, a little grudgingly. Did everyone have to be so perfect? I wasn’t looking forward to being the only failure in our year.
Mei scanned her results, and her mouth curved into a grin.
“I passed them all,” she said. “My father will be very pleased.”
“I’m glad,” I told her. “You deserve it.”
“Come on, Jade,” Dean said. “Moment of truth. Are we repeating this year?”
I sucked in a breath and picked up my envelope. There was no point in putting it off. I ripped the flap and slid out the sheet of white paper. It scanned it, left to right, top to bottom, looking for the inevitable ‘F’. Then I scanned it again. And again.
“I don’t get it,” I said at last. Cam leaned over my shoulder.
“Passed,” he said with a smile. “All passes.”
“Yeah, but how? I know I flunked the shifting exam. I tried to eat Brendon, for crying out loud.”
“I think there’s something written on the back,” Mei said, squinting at the reverse of my results sheet. I flipped it over. She was right, something was written there, in Shaun’s scrawling hand.
Jade,
Shifting back to human form while suffering from silver poisoning is more than equivalent to a first year shifting pass. Congratulations.
Slowly, a grin crept onto my face.
“I passed,” I said. “I did it. We’re moving up to second year.”
Cam wrapped an arm around me and pulled me close to him.
“Congratulations. Now, I think you owe me an answer.”
“An answer?”
“I asked ye something. On the, uh,” he glanced away for a moment, and then back again. “On the day I acted like an idiot and dumped you.”
“You weren’t being an idiot,” I said. “It looked like I was chasing after Ryan. I get it. But I’m pretty sure you didn’t ask me anything.”
He raised an eyebrow.
“Well, okay,” I admitted. “I might not have been paying attention.”
He rolled his eyes.
“Shocker. Do ye… Don’t feel like ye have tae say yes, but do yer want tae spend the summer in Scotland… with my pack?”
I took hold of his hand and squeezed.
“That was what you asked me?”
No wonder he hadn’t been happy I’d asked about Ryan. Scotland? With a real pack? I’d planned to go back to the farmhouse, but that place wasn’t home to me, and I didn’t want to spend summer alone. I wanted to spend it with Cam. And his pack.
“I would love to. Thank you. But I mean…” My heart twisted in my chest. “Is it okay for me to be there?”
What would they be like? What would they think of me, a Bitten cur? I didn’t want Cam to get in trouble with his family because of me.
“It’s a small pack,” Cam said. “They raised me to judge someone by who they are – not what they are. They’ll love you.”
I leaned into his chest with a sigh. This year had been wild. I’d been so determined to hate this place, hate everything here. Everyone here. But nothing about Fur ‘n’ Fang, hell, nothing about being a shifter, had been what I expected.
I spent half my time trying to get out of here. But now? With Cam by my side, and Dean and Mei – this place had become more than an academy to me. It was the home I hadn’t known I’d been searching for.
I couldn’t wait for next year, surrounded by my new family, and all because I’d been Bitten.
The End
Illegal Bittens on the loose, a rising rebellion, and a series of “accidents” that aren’t what they seem: Jade’s second year promises to be her most dangerous yet.
Read on for Curse Bitten.
CURSE BITTEN
Book 2 of the Fur ‘n’ Fang Academy Series
C. S. Churton
Chapter One
“Listen tae me, lass. Yer going tae get through this.”
I narrowed my eyes at the handsome Scottish shifter looking down at me and planted my hands on my hips.
“You’re mocking me.”
He shook his head, and a grin tugged at the corners of his mouth.
“Never. I wouldnae dare.”
I slapped his arm and leaned away from him.
“It’s alright for you,” I said. “You grew up knowing him. I’ve been here six weeks, and I haven’t been in the same room as him once. Which is fine by me, by the way.”
“No-one really knows the alpha,” Cam said, reaching an arm around my waist and pulling me into his lap. “Except his mate.”
I tried to squirm free, then gave up. There were worse places to be. Like in the same room as Cam’s alpha – which was exactly where I was going to be in under an hour.
“Why did he have to come back today? We’ll be gone tomorrow.”
“Did I mention it’s my birthday?”
“Yeah, I think you might have, once or twice.” I twisted round and looked up at him. “He makes it a point to be here for birthdays?”
Cam nodded.
“Aye, he tries.”
“It really is like an extended family, isn’t it?”
Shifter etiquette didn’t come naturally to me. I didn’t have a pack of my own. Hell, I hadn’t even heard of shifters until I’d been illegally bitten and turned a year ago – something that should have made me an outcast, but Cam’s pack – Cam’s family – had been nothing but welcoming to me.
I just wasn’t sure whether that extended to their alpha.
“The Alpha of Alphas you’ll defy,” Cam said with an amused smirk, “but the alpha of a tiny pack in Scotland scares ye?”
“Uh, yeah. Like, have you seen how many places there are to hide a body out here?”
“Ah. Dinnae worry about that, lass. We wouldnae waste the meat.”
I slapped him again and squirmed out of his lap.
“Where are ye going?”
“If I’ve got to meet your alpha, I’m not going to do it with your scent all over me. I’m going to hit the showers.”
He opened his mouth, and I cut him off.
“You’re not invited.”
“But… did I mention it’s my birthday?”
I ducked out of the single-story cottage that he’d built with his own hands (which accounted for the way the door tended to get stuck) before he could change my mind. The Scottish hillsides were windy, even this time of year, but since I’d been bitten, my body was less dependent on warmth. I wasn’t fully sure whether that was because of my newfound shifter magic… or the other sort. And since the alpha pack weren’t big on keeping records about things like illegally bitten mundanes, and halfbreeds, no-one knew for sure. It didn’t bother me as much as it used to.
I cut across the hillside and ducked into the old barn. It had been converted into a communal shower room of sorts, made up of a half dozen cubicles. I grabbed a towel and claimed
the closest.
The water was hot and powerful, and I felt it easing the kinks from my shoulders. I hadn’t been joking about wanting Cam’s scent off me. Sure, the rest of the pack knew we were spending a lot of time together, but that didn’t mean I had to rub their noses in it. I lathered up and scrubbed every inch of exposed skin, taking care to direct a blast of soap and water under the cuff around my right wrist. At least, unlike the shifters who weren’t old enough to attend Fur ‘n’ Fang, I only had to wear one cuff. ‘Coming of age’ meant more than just being old enough to buy alcohol around here.
I watched the soap flow down the drain, carrying Cam’s scent with it, and wished I could rid myself of my anxieties that easily. Trouble was, I had a nasty habit of saying the wrong thing at the wrong time, and being trapped at a dining table with the pack alpha was bound to bring out the worst in me.
He’d been away on Alpha pack business for the last week. Apparently Alpha Draeven – the alpha of every wolf shifter in the UK, the Alpha of Alphas – had summoned all of the alphas for some sort of conclave. Things around here seemed to run just as well without him. His pack were completely loyal, which seemed to be a theme with shifters. Even the kids round here who hadn’t achieved their first shift were loyal to him. His word was law, even when he was absent. He was laird of the estate the pack lived on, and his father had been before him, and his father – and all of them had been alpha to this small pack of thirty shifters. And if he took a dislike to the Bitten that one of his pack members had fallen in with… Well, like I said, there were a lot of places to hide a body out here.
I heard something scuffing outside – the joys of sharing living space with a whole pack. Apparently building your own home when you came of age was a tradition around here, and most of the cottages had no plumbing of their own.
I was about done anyway, so I shut off the shower. After a moment’s hesitation, I pulled my towel and clothes inside the cubicle with me. I’d managed six weeks without inadvertently flashing anyone, and it seemed a shame to ruin my record on my last night here.
I cocked my head and sniffed the steamy air. I’d been around the wolves long enough that each of their scents were imprinted in my mind – but this scent, I didn’t recognise.
“Hello?”
The footsteps stopped, but there was no answer. A chill that had nothing to do with standing half-dressed in a cooling shower cubicle ran the length of my spine. A stranger was out there. I yanked my shirt on over my head, hit the latch on the door, and tumbled out.
The barn was deserted, but the scent hung in the air. I took a step forward, sniffing. There was no doubt in my mind. An outsider had been here.
I crept out of the barn, sniffing and straining my ears as I went, but there was no-one waiting outside to ambush me. But he’d been there. Outside my shower cubicle. Another shiver ran through me. There was an intruder on the estate. I had to tell someone. The alpha. I had to tell the alpha. I spun around and collided with something solid. A yelp burst from my throat and I back peddled.
“Hey, what’s wrong, lass?”
“Cam! There’s someone here.”
“What? Nae, it’ll just be one of the bairns.”
I grabbed his shoulders and steered him into the barn.
“Do you smell that?”
He froze, and I felt his shoulders tense under my touch. He nodded, all traces of levity gone.
“I’ll alert the alpha,” he said.
“I’m coming with you.”
He shook his head before I even finished speaking.
“Nae. Find Hilda. We need to make sure none of the wee ‘uns are missing.”
The kids. Crap. He was right. I didn’t bother to argue, but set off at a dead sprint. The estate was vast, and the cottages on it well enough spaced that when I was human, I could never have covered the distance at a flat-out sprint without needing a break. As a shifter I was stronger and faster, and wasn’t even out of breath by the time I was hammering on Hilda’s door.
The woman who pulled the door open looked to be in her late forties. Her dark hair was streaked with the first traces of grey, and a dish rag hung from one hand.
“What’s all that racket about?” Her face creased into a frown as she looked me up and down. “What’s the matter with ye, Jade?”
“There’s an intruder on the estate,” I said. “Cam said to check on all the kids.”
She stared at me for a half-second, then tossed the towel aside.
“Blair, get everyone to the big house,” she called back over her shoulder.
“What should I do?” I asked.
“Come with me. Isla and Brody were feeding the sheep. Ye can shift, aye?”
She gave me a sideways glance, and I dipped my chin in a nod. Yes, I could shift, though I wasn’t supposed to when I was away from Fur ‘n’ Fang, not until I’d been assessed and graduated. And whether or not I’d be able to control myself if I did shift was anyone’s guess. I could be more of a danger to the pack than the intruder.
“Good. Quickly, now.”
She took off at a run with the athleticism of someone half her age, and I had to pay close attention to the ground beneath my feet to avoid turning an ankle. Shifter healing was fast, but not fast enough that a twisted ankle wouldn’t put me out of any fight that might be coming.
A dark shape fell in beside us and a strangled scream burst from my lips.
“It’s me,” Cam said.
“What the hell’s going on?” I said, not breaking my stride. He shook his head.
“No idea. So far everyone’s accounted for, except Isla and Brody.”
I could make out the flock moving in the distance, downwind of us, and without a word, the three of us pushed on, running harder and faster. If the kids were out there alone with the sheep, they were vulnerable. They were eight and ten, way too young to shift and protect themselves. And the scent I’d picked up in the barn belonged to an adult male. I wasn’t sure if attacking rival packs was a thing, and I suddenly couldn’t find my voice to ask.
“There!” I said, pointing to two small shapes moving round the outskirt of the flock.
“Oh, thank heavens,” Hilda said, her voice hitching, and she took off towards them. I was about to follow when Cam caught my arm and nodded towards some boulders set into the rocky mountainside. I frowned, unsure about his sudden interest in the large stones. And then one of them twitched.
I glanced over at Hilda, but she was already approaching the kids. She could get them back to the rest of the pack by herself. I nodded to Cam. Time to find out who this prick was who thought it was okay to skulk around shower rooms, and in the fields where kids were tending the flock.
I touched the metal band around my wrist and raised an eyebrow at Cam. He shook his head. Looked like we were going in human. I wasn’t sure that was such a smart idea – it would take me at least thirty seconds to shift, and in a fight that was long enough to get you killed. But it was Cam’s call. And he was probably right – we were both new to this. It’d be easy for one of us to lose control. And by one of us, I meant the one who hadn’t grown up as a shifter.
We circled off, moving downwind of the intruder and keeping to the shadows. We were twenty feet from him when he spotted us and jumped to his feet. His clothes were dirty and his dark hair unkempt, and the couple of days’ worth of stubble across his lower jaw did nothing to make him look any less feral. The movement carried his scent right to me – this was the one. I nodded to Cam.
“Wait!” the shifter said, backing away as we stalked towards him. “I mean you no harm.”
“You’re trespassing,” Cam snarled. “Around women and kids. This is Alpha Lachlan’s territory, and your presence here is an insult.”
“No, it’s not like that.” His eyes swivelled from Cam to me and back again.
“No?” Cam said, grabbing hold of the man’s shabby coat. “Then what is it like?”
“Please, I was just looking for food, and somewhere to hide.”
“From who?” I asked.
“It’s not safe out here,” he said.
“Nae,” Cam said. “Not for you. Not if you dinnae start talking.”
“Cam,” I said, my voice a harsh whisper. “The sheep!”
Cam twisted round to look at the flock, bunched up together and running for the foot of the hills.
“Please,” the man said. “They’re here.”
And as he said it, I saw two dark shapes cutting across the open ground – heading right for us.
Chapter Two
“What do we do?” I said.
“Run,” the intruder said.
“Fight,” Cam said, pulling his shirt over his head.
I nodded. Hilda needed time to get the kids back to the rest of the pack. And whatever this intruder was doing here, being hunted by his own pack, I was pretty sure Lachlan was going to want him alive – long enough to hear his story, at least.
“You, stay here,” Cam said, jabbing a finger at the intruder. “If I have tae hunt yer down, you willnae like what comes next, do yer get me?”
I grabbed the hem of my t-shirt, and then glared at the intruder.
“Hey.” I rotated my finger. “This isn’t a peep show. Turn around.”
“But – you’re still in training cuffs. You don’t stand a chance, either of you.”
“Let us worry about that,” I said, turning my back on him. The two wolves were covering the ground quickly, and I wasn’t sure I could shift before they got here. But I had to try. If they were mature shifters, then there was no way Cam could handle them on his own. I tugged off my jeans and kicked them aside, then dropped to all fours. The change tore through me, dislocating both of my shoulders at once as they became too big for their sockets. I ducked my chin and turned my scream of pain into a snarl of anger, baring my teeth. My spine pressed against my skin, twisting and buckling like some living thing as each vertebrae enlarged itself. Fur erupted all over my body, from my face to the tip of the tail forcing its way from my tailbone.
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